Jonathan Ball wrote:
> My earlier point, that the goods whose efficiency of production is being
> examined must be as narrowly defined as possible, can use some further
> elaboration. The notion that the more resource-efficient good should be
> produced to the exclusion of the less efficient one is only valid if the
> goods are perfect, or very close, substitutes for one another in the
> evaluation of consumers.
>
> In the late 1950s and early 1960s in Los Angeles, and possibly
> elsewhere, house builders were building "Gold Medallion All-Electric"
> houses. No natural gas was supplied to these houses at all; the water
> heater, house heating, clothes dryer, stove and oven all were electric.
> It was considered very Jetsons, the wave of the future; natural gas was
> viewed as SO Victorian.

That was the trend everywhere, and it occurred up through the early '80s
here. Austin was one of the municipalities that bought into the South
Texas Nuclear Project (Austin is one of the last cities to run its own
electric utilities). The lure of STNP was "electricity that would be too
cheap to meter," and the reality was twenty years of delays and cost
overruns before getting *any* generation from the plant. Most Texans are
enjoying deregulated pricing. We have the highest rates in the state,
and among the highest utility costs in the country.

> Of course, the price of electricity climbed dramatically, even long
> before the electricity "crisis" of 2000-2001, and those houses came to
> be seen as white elephants. The production of electricity clearly was
> relatively inefficient compared to the production of natural gas, as
> reflected in the prices of the two utilities.
>
> Does this mean that electricity production should have been stopped, and
> natural gas production promoted? Clearly not. While electricity and gas
> are fairly close substitutes for some energy uses, they obviously are
> not fully substitutable. No one has ever seen a gas-powered television
> set or vacuum cleaner.
>
> This is where people opposed to feeding grain to livestock make a
> critical mistake. Consumers don't merely buy generic "food", any
> component of which is a perfect substitute for any other, but that is
> exactly what the "inefficiency" argument against feeding grain to
> livestock is suggesting. Instead, consumers evaluate food items
> according to what nutritional and taste requirements they meet.
>
> Efficiency of production only realistically pertains to goods that are,
> in the eyes of consumers, close substitutes for one another. At the
> extreme of substitutability, one may consider the exact *same* good
> produced according to two different methods. Thus, the consumer is
> completely indifferent, in terms of his ability to use the commodity,
> among electricity generated by coal-fired, gas-fired or nuclear
> generating plants; electricity is electricity. In this case, the
> efficiency of the means of production IS relevant, and only the most
> efficient - lowest cost - form of electricity generation should be used,
> where "cost" takes into account all the private and social costs.
> Broccoli, however, is a terrible substitute for sirloin steak, as are
> raspberries, tomatoes, potatoes and eggplant. The consumer RIGHTLY
> ignores efficiency differences in the production of these items, and
> considers each item separately, according to how much he likes them and
> his willingness to pay for them.
>
> The "inefficiency" argument against feeding grain to livestock simply
> doesn't work.

Very well reasoned, Jon. I agree with you about the suitability of
substitutes, but let's entertain the activists on their own terms for a
moment.

Let's compare sirloin steak to a "fake meat" like seitan (wheat gluten).
Before one ends up with edible seitan, whole wheat has to be milled into
flour and then gluten is extracted by "washing" the starch out of dough.
Gluten makes up a small portion of wheat flour, so seitan is a very
inefficient use of wheat flour. It takes six to eight pounds of flour to
make one pound of seitan -- how much corn does it take to add a pound to
a steer on a finishing diet? The resulting protein in the seitan isn't
even complete, meaning it lacks certain essential amino acids.

The same is true with tofu. The finished product doesn't equate to a
pound-for-pound use of soybeans. Soybeans are boiled, milled, and
strained to make soy milk; the pulp, often called okara, can be consumed
in other products, but many tofu makers discard it (including to meat
producers). A coagulant is added to the soy milk. The curdle is pressed.
The water remaining from the coagulation and pressing is discarded. It's
a wasteful process. Tofu, like seitan, lacks certain essential amino
acids. The yield is similar to that of feed given to finish beef.

For the activists to be consistent when discussing "inefficiencies" of
meat production, they should dissuade "inefficient" veg-n use of wheat
(seitan) and soybeans (tofu) rather than promoting them as valid
alternatives. They should also note that grazed animals don't eat
grain-based feed. Since humans cannot easily convert grasses into
protein, these activists should promote grass-fed beef, venison, and lamb.

I also don't think it's dawned on these folks that there are plenty of
other areas in which grains are used "inefficiently" but which they
would never complain. Grains are malted to make sweeteners, which seem
to worry veg-n activists much from all the sugary recipes given at AFV
and other veg-n recipe sites. Nor do they object much to "wasting"
grains in beer or distilled spirits.